Credit Suisse CEO responds to calls for bank to break up

Credit Suisse boss Tidjane Thiam staunchly defended his record as CEO of Switzerland’s second-largest bank Thursday, despite calls through an activist investor for the lender to break up.

In recent weeks, a relatively little nevertheless top-performing activist hedge fund announced an ambitious plan to break up Credit Suisse. RBR Capital Advisors, led by outspoken trader Rudolf Bohli, said This kind of hoped the bank’s management could break the lender into three parts.

When This kind of was put to Thiam that will the level of returns investors could expect through the bank at present were below the industry standard, he replied, “Why am I here? Why was there a change? Why are we engaging in This kind of big restructuring program? This kind of’s because things were not optimal.”

Tapping into investor impatience with the bank’s three-year turnaround project, RBR Capital Advisors called on Credit Suisse to split into an investment bank, a wealth manager along with an asset manager in order to support share prices.